Bryce beamed then swiveled his chair to face me. “The connection you have with Mzatal?” he said, leaning forward. “I, uh, kinda have that with Seretis. It’s not like we talk with words, but we can sense and understand each other.”
I stared at him, stunned. I’d have been right on board if he’d told me Seretis had placed a sigil on him or given him an artifact. But comparing it to my unique and intimate essence connection with Mzatal? A number of possible explanations ran through my mind, though none seemed to fit the scenario. Seretis and Lord Rayst were partners, but that meant little since the demonic lords weren’t much into the whole jealousy thing. After a few thousand years of existence, those sort of insecurities went out the window—if they’d ever had them in the first place. However, Seretis was bisexual and, as far as I knew, Bryce was firmly heterosexual. Not that it had ever come up. More than possible that I’d jumped to conclusions.
“Oh, okay,” I said as I readjusted my assumptions. “You and he are . . . lovers?”
Bryce laughed. “No,” he said, sitting back. “There’s no sex. But we hit it off from the start—like that childhood friend you wanted to do everything with and couldn’t imagine living without, only as adults.”
“Gotcha. A major bromance.”
“I guess,” he said reluctantly, “though I wish there was a more, er, macho description.”
“A sweaty bromance?”
“That’s worse.”
“A machomance?”
“Oh god, please stop,” he said with a laugh. “Anyway, now we have an essence bond. A conscious one.” He shook his head. “I realize now I should’ve told you earlier, but I’m still getting used to the concept, and things have been crazy since I got here.”
“Nah, it’s cool,” I said as I tried to shuffle pieces of info into a picture that made sense. Mzatal had what he called an essence bond with the reyza Gestamar, and Turek, an ancient savik, was essence-bound to Szerain. Maybe my bond with Mzatal was the same as that? Except, y’know, with sex.
The rest of Bryce’s words filtered into my brain. “You said that your bond is ‘a conscious one.’ What do you mean?”
“That’s kind of an odd story,” he said. “It didn’t start out conscious.” He ran a hand over his hair, blew out his breath. “After Paul went to Kadir, Mzatal sent me to Seretis’s realm. Considering all the shit I’d gone through with the plantation, Farouche, and everything else, I needed the mental health break and a change of scenery. For most of the first day everyone left me alone, and I wandered around or sat out on the beach. But that evening Seretis came out to talk to me and, well, we clicked.” A smile lit Bryce’s face. “We were damn near inseparable after that—like we’d known each other forever.”
I couldn’t help but echo his smile as his joy in the friendship resonated through his words. And holy shit, did he ever deserve it. Bryce had spent the last fifteen years as a reluctant hitman and muscle for Farouche—a tough and terrible life that had ripped at his essence. Though he’d committed terrible crimes while in Farouche’s service, Bryce was one of the most compassionate and empathetic people I knew. Farouche had turned a kind and caring man—who’d been training to be a veterinarian, for fuck’s sake—into his personal monster. For that alone, I was glad Farouche was dead.
“On the fourth day we were on his veranda,” Bryce continued, “and Seretis initiated a bond—and not in a figure of speech way. Spontaneous. Instinctual. It felt like a linking of minds at that stage. I didn’t understand what was happening, but I didn’t want to stop it either.” He grew serious. “Right in the middle of the process, a chunk of masonry the size of a Volkswagen fell onto the veranda not even a dozen feet behind us.”
I straightened. “To stop you from bonding?”
“That’s what I believe.” Anger and worry darkened his eyes. “Seretis didn’t think it was an accident either, and got pretty shook up.” The worry deepened. “But when he tried to figure out who might want to stop it—and why—he got a killer headache. It wouldn’t go away until he let go of thinking about it.”
“Shit,” I breathed. “When I introduced Mzatal to Jill, he connected with the baby and immediately got slammed with that same kind of headache. He told me it had happened many times before.” I already knew the demonic lords were manipulated to block awareness of their maternal human origins. Clearly there were other secrets they weren’t allowed to know. My mouth twisted as I met Bryce’s eyes. “It’s as if someone doesn’t want the lords to think about certain things.”
A muscle in his jaw twitched. “Yeah, well, I didn’t bring up who might’ve shoved a couple of tons of masonry off the wall.”
“Can’t imagine why,” I said with a disingenuous bat of my eyelashes. “By the way, on a totally unrelated subject, what’s the name of Seretis’s ptarl? I don’t know all of the demahnk yet.”